Tag: design

Never in my life did I ever think – “I’m just not gay enough.” – until my former partners and I became a member business of the North Texas GLBT Chamber of Commerce. In the 6-1/2 years we were members, we were approached multiple times about becoming a certified LGBT Business Enterprise. After all, we were woman-owned. Why not LGBT-owned?

Because as fate would have it, we weren’t gay enough. Which is the response I would give every time I was asked – feeling a little like Dr. Evil telling Scotty he was the Diet Coke of Evil. Just one calorie. Not gay enough!

And before you say: “But Larry, you’re more gay before 9 am than most people are all day” (and a special thanks to Will & Grace for getting that little nugget stuck in my head) – I would like to go on record as saying I had nothing to do with not being certified. I was plenty gay. It was getting my other two partners to switch teams that was the problem – especially the married one with two kids.

Of the estimated 90,000 members in the American Institute of Architecture, there are how many hundreds of firms represented? Yet there are only ten of us certified.

Not that I’m going to make too much noise about that. I’m fine being one of ten firms available to the NGLCC’s 140+ corporate partners looking to fulfill supplier diversity needs. And I’m fine being recognized this year in front of 1000+ attendees at the NGLCC business and leadership conference.

For starters – I’m an architect. Have been for nearly 20 years. I’ve been an employee and a business owner. At the moment, I’m working for myself after over 8 years with two partners. I have to say I’m enjoying the change. Sure, my boss is kind of a dick sometimes, but he let’s me leave early or come in late if I feel like it.

For seconds – I’m gay. That I’ve been doing for a lot longer than I’ve been doing architecture. But I think that’s a given. I’m married to a very patient husband. It’s been a little over 3 years, and it only took 18 years together before we were finally hitched. So if you’re doing the math, that’s a little over 21 years. As I like to say – longer than some of my parents’ marriages.

I’ve always been out at work. Even at school. And I don’t know that I’ve seen that as an issue. However, as I became more involved in the LGBT community, I realized how isolated I’ve been in the profession. I often joke that I’m the only gay architect in Dallas. (Not true, but we’ll get to that in another post.) At least it feels that way.

The Big Gay Architect Blog will talk about queer influence in architecture. I’ve heard people say that they’re architects first and gay second, but I think you can’t be gay and pretend that has no influence on you as an architect.

Some of the posts will just be about architecture. Some will just be about LGBT issues. Others are going to intersect. I won’t always get everything right so don’t expect me to. And I’ll probably be on the wrong side of opinion from time to time. But come on the journey with me, and let’s see where we end up.